Although the best psychological treatments, such as cognitive behavioral therapy, for anxiety disorders already rely on fear extinction mechanisms, these treatments underutilize principles of vicarious extinction learning. Vicarious extinction learning is a form of social safety learning that involves learning safety from the experience of others and can potentially enhance treatment potency. Social anxiety disorder (SAD), which is characterized by persistent social avoidance due to fear of negative evaluation by others, may uniquely benefit from vicarious extinction learning. Broader social contexts, like cultural norms, can also have influence on social learning and the efficacy in treatments of social anxiety. Although culture is a broad and nuanced construct, interdependent and independent self-construals have been shown to capture two of the many facets of culture. In this study, we propose that cultural factors, such as interdependent and independent self-construals, may impact vicarious extinction learning in people with high levels of social anxiety symptoms. Twenty socially anxious adults and twenty healthy controls will complete the Self-Construal Scale (SCS) and undergo a vicarious extinction task while undergoing fMRI. We expect that those with interdependent self-construals will show enhanced safety learning due to their value for seeing themselves as similar to others, as compared to those with independent self-construals. This will be evidenced by lower skin conductance responses (SCR) and greater ventromedial prefrontal cortex activation during the reinstatement phase of the task. Our results will highlight a potentially important cultural moderator of social safety learning and advance our understanding of the boundaries and clinical implications of learning safety from others.

In order to compare observations of massive stars with theoretical predictions, stars must be classified accurately. Classification traditionally relies upon expensive new telescope observations. As the field of astronomy enters a new era of Big Data, Modern computational techniques may be used in place of these methods; however the results still require rigorous validation in order to be trusted. Recently, Dorn-Wallenstein et al. (2021) utilized a novel machine learning technique to classify a large sample of massive stars. This resulted in putative classifications for ~2550 stars. Our project serves as a follow-up to validate the results of Dorn-Wallenstein et al. and identify stars with rare evolutionary phases that are most useful for probing stellar evolution. We test the hypothesis that these classifications are reliable by obtaining new observations with the ARCES instrument mounted on the Apache Point Observatory 3.5-meter telescope. Using these data, we assigned classifications to the stars in our sample, focusing on identifying rare objects and evolved supergiants. To this end, we have developed custom software designed to navigate through the key features in our observations and allow for easy identification of an object's spectral type (i.e., its evolutionary stage). We find that our observations support the classifications made by Dorn-Wallenstein et al. Our future work will focus on expanding our sample with further observations in the Southern Hemisphere. This work is critical in order to prepare for the age of Big Data in astronomy.

Undergraduate nursing students—the next generation of health care providers—play a pivotal role in caring for people living with dementia (PLWD) as their numbers continue to rise. Unfortunately, new graduates may not be adequately prepared by their educational programs to care for PLWD. This study aimed to capture students’ current attitudes about and barriers to working with older adults and PLWD post-graduation, especially related to their desire for receiving additional clinical and didactic curricular content. We also evaluated students’ interest in enrolling in the elective dementia and Long-Term Care (LTC) Externship. An initial survey was distributed to first and second-year bachelor of nursing (BSN) students at the University of Washington School of Nursing (SoN) in April 2021. The survey consisted of 20 questions modified from the Dementia Attitude Scale (DAS) and 8 questions related to respondents’ health care experience and attitudes about nursing care of older adults. The survey was completed by 76 first and second-year BSN students. The survey focused on students’ comfort level working with PLWD and their willingness to expand geriatric and dementia care skills. To gather more illustrative qualitative data, we conducted a focus group with 8 BSN students. The survey results indicated low self-reported knowledge of nursing care for PLWD as well as a lack of desire to work in the discipline immediately following graduation. However, the majority of focus group members (N= 6) expressed interest in acquiring additional knowledge and hands-on learning opportunities in care for older adults and PLWD. Key components that would attract students to geriatrics training and a LTC externship included: structured seminar; access to interactive, relevant pre-study materials developed by professionals; and 4-6 hour clinicals of hands-on skills. Conclusions: The findings from these surveys have informed the development of a LTC Externship, which is currently being piloted and evaluated.

Campus safety issues are not typically included in institutional diversity efforts. However, it's important to understand how students with diverse ranges of social identities perceive campus safety; promoting safety should be prioritized. To understand marginalized student perceptions of campus safety and policy, I analyzed focus group transcripts (31 participants) from PNW LSAMP (Pacific Northwest Louis Stokes Alliance for Minority Participation) students and recent alumni from the University of Washington, Washington State University, Oregon State University, Portland State University and Boise State University. Data was coded deductively in NVivo by a pre-determined coding scheme guided by the research question but allowing for inductive coding as other themes emerged. My findings indicate that gender identity has a high impact on perceived safety. Women and non binary individuals tended to discuss feeling uncomfortable in campus areas at night and mentioned taking preventative safety measures like carrying tasers. Participants identified emergency blue lights and safe rides as initiatives which maintained or improved safety feelings. This indicates that on some level, universities are already protecting marginalized students. Little discussion on policy improvement emerged, but instead how universities can use clarity and police presence (or absence) to show students they value their safety. Namely, several Black/African American participants expressed preference for more detailed notifications on how to take action when safety threats are alerted to the university community. Participants generally expressed that police did not improve their safety perceptions or that police presence could detract from other students’ safety depending on their race. These findings suggest that universities are protecting marginalized student safety to some degree. Next steps include clarifying safety notifications, expanding safe ride and emergency blue light operations, and conducting broader surveys on perceptions of campus and municipal police, given police brutality incidents and mixed literature.

Universities hold expectations of students to possess forms of cultural and social capital in order to be successful in their educational careers. This may include knowledge of the financial aid process, an ability to build relationships with faculty, and an understanding of cultural norms of the middle-class. While research shows that underrepresented students may be less likely to possess this capital, institutional expectations regarding social/cultural capital, specifically among first-generation (FG) students, seems largely unexplored in educational research. The goal of our research is to identify the hidden things FG students are expected to learn in higher education, and how they are able to learn those things. We conducted focus groups of students enrolled in LSAMP (a program that supports underrepresented students in STEM) across 5 universities in the Pacific Northwest over Zoom. Our research focuses on how the hidden curriculum, through the lense of cultural norms and the Federal Application for Student Aid (FAFSA), serves as a barrier to self-identified first-generation students in STEM. Focus groups were conducted by LSAMP students across three universities affiliated with LSAMP and researchers at the University of Washington. Focus groups were recorded and transcribed through Zoom, and later coded and analyzed. Our analysis focuses on identifying common barriers among FG STEM students. In our focus groups, FG students spoke about how relationships with faculty and peers were hard to establish because of their FG background, or because of different/potentially intersecting identities, and also how the FAFSA served as a barrier to them. Our findings support the idea that knowledge of the hidden norms and processes may be expected of students by universities, and that FG students may not possess this knowledge. By developing a better understanding of the experiences of FG students with the hidden curriculum, we can better learn how to support these students.

Sexual minority women, and bisexual women in particular, are at greater risk of experiencing sexual assault and other types of traumas and stress, as well as heightened symptom severity than heterosexual women. Among sexual minority women, bisexual women in comparison to lesbian women have shown a higher risk of reporting worse mental health. To our knowledge, only three studies have looked at differences in mental health in bisexual and lesbian women who have been sexually assaulted, but their results have been contradictory. As such, the purpose of this study is to investigate the symptom differences between bisexual and lesbian women following sexual assault to better understand their differences. To do this, I conducted a secondary analysis of an existing national data set that surveyed 1057 sexual minority women. I used bivariate statistics tests to compare lesbian and bisexual women regarding their mental health following sexual assault with a focus on anxiety, depression, and PTSD symptoms. No statistically significant differences were found between the two sexual identity groups as a function of sexual assault, but bisexual women reported greater symptoms of depression regardless of sexual assault status in comparison to lesbian women. A potential explanation for this difference could be that bisexual women may have higher levels of minority stress (i.e., stress resulting from societal prejudice and other stigmatizing experiences) than lesbian women, which has been connected to heightened mental health issues. Future studies should consider minority stress as a factor when studying the two sexual identities to better tailor research and treatment to bisexual and lesbian women’s unique identities.